'All week, the US has been focused on the Twitter IPO as if it were the Marshall Plan of finance, as if this one money-splashing event had long-term implications for capitalist peace. Silicon Valley millionaires gossiped about the company's decadent $30bn valuation and started dreaming of IPOs that would make them rich for working at unprofitable-but-innovative companies too.
'Meanwhile, in the real America – the one where you can't call Uber to take you to a launch party – people are dropping out of the workforce, the recovery is weakening and early cuts in food stamps are already slamming the poor.
'That real America is the one that's not getting much attention. Part of the reason is that it's not glamorous, and it doesn't have any startup-founder creation myths. Another part of the reason is to be found in misleading economic statistics. Economic indicators keep supporting the idea of a "weak recovery", and for some reason experts keep focusing on the recovery part and not the weakness.'
Heidi Moore, US finance and economics editor,
The Guardian (UK)
November 8, 2013
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